Tag Archives: ascot

We want her to bow out at the top! Aussie super-horse Black Caviar to retire after 25-race unbeaten run

PUBLISHED:

06:21 GMT, 17 April 2013

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UPDATED:

06:53 GMT, 17 April 2013

Unbeaten Australian mare Black Caviar will retire after winning 25 consecutive races, with her trainer Peter Moody admitting that the super sprinter 'has done everything we asked her to do.'

Moody, appearing at a news conference in front of Caulfield race track on Wednesday, where the six-year-old mare will make a farewell appearance for race patrons on Saturday, said he and the ownership group led by Neil Werrett had discussed Black Caviar's future over the past few days and 'we decided at lunch today' to announce her retirement.

Fond farewell: Black Caviar is paraded in front of the media with strapper Donna Fisher

Emotional: Trainer Peter Moody announces retirement of Black Caviar

Race team: Black Caviar and her connections at the press conference

'She has done everything we have asked her to do,' trainer Peter Moody said.

'We
thought long and hard about racing on but believe she has done
everything we asked of her and felt it was the right time to call time
on her wonderful career.

'She's in great shape and that's the way we wanted her to bow out. We just thought the time was right – it was a hard decision.

'She brought interest to our sport that hasn't been there for decades.'

Black Caviar, purchased by Moody for
$225,000, won $8 million in prize money, including an Australian-record
15 Group One wins, most over distances around 1,200 meters.

She'll now have some time being spelled in a paddock before being bred.

'We hope that in three years, Peter
Moody will be training a progeny of Black Caviar,' said Werrett, his
voice breaking at times during the retirement announcement.

Black Caviar, ridden by her regular
jockey Luke Nolen, won her 25th race last Friday in the T.J. Smith
Stakes at Royal Randwick by two lengths. It was the sprinter's third win
since coming back in February from an eight-month injury layoff.

Race to sign Owen hots up – but it's Strictly and I'm a Celebrity doing battle!

By
Paul Collins

PUBLISHED:

12:27 GMT, 3 April 2013

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UPDATED:

17:12 GMT, 3 April 2013

Michael Owen may have failed his screen test to head BT Sport’s new analysis team — but the BBC and ITV are still in a fight to sign him up.

It has been reported that the Stoke striker, who has recently announced he will retire at the end of the season, is at the centre of TV battle between the makers of Strictly Come Dancing and I’m a Celebrity.

Both networks are apparently trying to sign for the autumn series of both shows.

Dancefloor or jungle How Owen might look on Strictly (left) and I'm a Celebrity

In demand: The clamour to sign up Owen is in full swing

Retiring: The former England striker, now at Stoke, will call it a day next month

Owen is to become a BBC television and radio pundit in his retirement, having made occasional appearances on Match of the Day already this season.

BT Sport, who need a marquee signing from the dressing room to head the analysts team for their Premier League coverage next season, could have been expected to jump at the chance to sign such an illustrious footballer as Owen, whose services have been strongly touted to them.

But the word inside BT headquarters in the Olympic Park is that Owen’s ‘monotone’ displays on the BBC have been considered ‘poor’, although it will help Owen’s Beeb future that their lead presenter Gary Lineker has been supportive.

The first confirmed pundit appointment
for Owen is at Royal Ascot. Racehorse owner and breeder Owen is on a
panel of experts who will be giving tips to the 570-a-head patrons of
the prime Bessborough Restaurant on the Thursday of the Royal meeting in
June.

Owen is also planning to launch a player agency business when he retires from professional football at the end of this season.

Frozen out: Owen has had limited first-team opportunities at Stoke

Stoke City centre forward Owen, who has previously starred for Liverpool, Real Madrid and Manchester United, will hang up his boots at the end of his season, bringing the curtain down on a difficult few years in which he has sustained several serious injuries that have chronically limited his game-time.

In a blog on his website former England man Owen explained: ‘On July 1, I propose to set up Michael Owen Management Ltd. focusing on guiding young players through their careers and offering them advice at every juncture of what can be a career full of pitfalls.’

'He's not Kauto Star but there'll never be another', says Walsh as he aims for King George VI glory on Kauto Stone

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UPDATED:

22:45 GMT, 23 December 2012

Ruby Walsh talks to Racing Correspondent Marcus Townend about his attempt to win a sixth King George VI Chase on Kauto Star's little brother Kauto Stone.

Christmas, a time for families. Ruby Walsh hopes that’s the case at Kempton on Boxing Day.

For five of the last six years, the Irish jockey has written ever more remarkable chapters in the King George VI Chase story as Kauto Star made history and ultimately eclipsed the achievements of legendary four-time winner Desert Orchid.

On Wednesday, Walsh will try to write the next one not in stone but on Stone, Kauto Stone, little brother of his horse of a lifetime.

The Christmas king: Ruby Walsh is focussed on fresh challenges as the steeplechasing world has changed

‘He’s not Kauto Star,’ Walsh says with a smile, ‘there won’t ever be another Kauto Star. They’re like chalk and cheese really. Kauto Stone is a different colour and much smaller. But, then again, my brother’s six foot two!’

The 7-1 chance was a grade one winner in France before making the same trip across the Channel last year that Kauto Star made in 2004.

Kauto Stone opened up with a grade two chase win before four defeats, including a flop behind King George rival Riverside Theatre at Ascot in February when Walsh feels he was off colour. That setback dented the horse’s reputation.

But expectations have risen with last month’s win in Down Royal’s three-mile Grade One JNWine.com Champion Chase, a race Kauto Star won twice, when he fended off Flight Lieutenant, the subsequent Hennessy Gold Cup third.

Up for the challenge: Walsh talks to Sportsmail's Racing Correspondent Marcus Townend

Walsh, 33, says: ‘Kauto Stone is a decent horse in his own right. He was good when he won at Down Royal (in November). He proved he gets the three-mile trip which is a question mark for some of the others like Cue Card.

‘He was very good in France and at six-years-old, you’d be hoping there is a bit of improvement there. Trainer Paul Nicholls is very happy with him and Paul’s got a great record in the King George. If he’s happy, I’m happy.’

Happiness is not something that has come gift-wrapped in the Kauto Star world in the last fortnight with the public spat between owner Clive Smith and trainer Nicholls as the retired 12-year-old suddenly left the stable.

Walsh is careful not to get drawn into the crossfire.

The pressure is on: Walsh on-board Kauto Stone at Aintree earlier this year

‘I’ve been reading about it but my time with Kauto Star finished in March. I will forever love him and be indebted to him but I knew when he pulled up in the Gold Cup that I was finished with him,’ Walsh says.

‘My biggest nightmare had always been standing at the back of a fence holding him and waiting for a vet to come.

‘That didn’t happen so when we pulled up, I felt we had had a good time together. ‘I hope I did him justice, he gave me great days and we parted company on a happy note. I didn’t make a big deal of it because that was (Gold Cup winner) Synchronised’s day.

‘I hate it when the horse that is bowing out overshadows the winner. This game is about winning.’

In the post-Kauto Star era, winning the King George will look possible to all 10 jockeys who line up at Kempton.

The fight to be top staying chaser will continue in the Lexus Case at Leopardstown on Friday, when Flemenstar and Sir Des Champs clash again.

Past glory: Ruby Walsh smiles as he looks at Kauto Star after winning The William Hill King George VI in 2011

The landscape has changed, especially for Walsh. Old allies Denman, Neptune Collonges and Master Minded are all retired while Al Ferof, who would have been his King George mount, has a long-term injury.

The rider, too, is back to searching for the new chasing king and he detects vulnerability in 7-4 King George favourite Long Run, the former Gold Cup and King George winner who jousted with Kauto Star in his last two seasons.

The jockey says: ‘Long Run won the (2009) Feltham Novices’ Chase as a four-year-old. He was good at five and six when he won a King George and Gold Cup.

‘Maybe that was his peak, not unlike another French-bred, Master Minded. He was a runaway Champion Chase winner at five, just won at six and not the same at seven. Long Run is still running to a high level of form but not to the level when he won the King George and Gold Cup. Criticism of his amateur jockey Sam Waley-Cohen is not fair, but life is not fair.

‘When you get beaten you’re wrong. The first person to point a finger at is the guy on his back, be it AP, me or Sam.

‘People are jumping on the bandwagon because he is Mr Sam Waley-Cohen but I don’t agree with it. He is still the guy who won a King George, Gold Cup and Feltham Chase on him.

‘He is not doing anything different. I’d say the difference is the horse, not the jockey.’But for Walsh, the horse really will be different on Boxing Day. Kauto Stone not Kauto Star.

He says: ‘It is different challenge on a new horse. A different era and a different time. It’s like anything, the more you are attached to it the more it hurts when it is not there and there is uncertainty, I suppose. But life moves on and so will I.’

Like a rolling Stone, maybe.

Ruby Walsh is sponsored by Racing UK and Daily Mail readers can enjoy a 25 per cent saving to the premium racing channel on Sky for 12 months. Call 0844 472 5777 (UK) or 0818 776 779 (ROI) and quote 'Daily Mail offer' before December 31.

Excelebration proved no match for US ace Wise Dan in The Mile as the Aidan O’Brien-trained colt could only finish fourth under Joseph O’Brien.

America’s top rated horse broke the Santa Anita track record with a time of 1.31.78 as he beat Animal Kingdom by a length and a half with third-placed Obviously holding off Excelebration by a nose.

Excelebration would have had a near perfect record if he had not run into Frankel in Europe.

Running free: Wise Dan heads for glory

But he was unable to add to his career-best victory in Ascot’s Queen Elizabeth II Stakes on October 20 in what is expected to be his last run.

O’Brien said: ‘It is only 13 days after Ascot but that might have taken the edge off him but we had to have a go. It has not been a bad day.’

Earlier O’Brien had won the Juvenile Turf with Ryan Moore-ridden George Vancouver.

His Coolmore Stud owners also had a half share in Todd Pletcher’s Juvenile winner Shanghai Bobby, whose rider Rosie Napravnik is only th second female jockey to win a Breeders' Cup race.

The feature $5million Classic, run without European representation, was won by Ian Wilkes-trained Fort Larned after the Brian Hernandez jnr ridden colt came out on top in fierce home-stretch battle with Mucho Macho Man.

When Tony McCoy arrived at Ascot on Saturday, he looked in urgent need of attention at the hospital beside the racecourse.

Only 24 hours earlier he'd been floored at Wetherby by a vicious kick in the face that would have put paid to lesser mortals.

Battered and bruised: McCoy was not to be denied a winner, despite his injuries

After surveying the damage, his great
friend Jonjo O'Neill suggested: 'Most probably there is not another
jockey who would ride the next day after taking a hit like that.'

Iron-man McCoy has spent a lifetime defying medical opinion on his way to a record-breaking 17 championships.

For this is one of those rare sportsmen who has never willingly retired hurt.

On Saturday, he was at it again,
wondering what all the fuss was about as he turned up for work with 20
stitches in his face, two broken teeth and a patchwork of plasters on
his nose and lip.

First, though, he had to pass a
fitness test by a racecourse doctor who consulted the BHA's medical
officer Michael Turner before giving him the go-ahead.

Iron man: McCoy partnered My Tent Or Your to victory

Naturally, McCoy didn't doubt he was
able to take up his book of rides, though he looked an even whiter shade
of pale than normal after claiming his 101st winner of the season on My
Tent Or Yours for Nicky Henderson.

'I promise you I'm not that bad,' he assured me through clenched teeth.

'It's more superficial than anything else. I've certainly felt worse after a fall,' he added.

'I was holding the horse after he dropped me when he spooked, lashed out and caught me full in the face.

'I've broken a couple of teeth, but
luckily my dentist put in a couple of temporaries last night. The doctor
at Wetherby also sorted me out with a plastic surgeon at York Hospital
who stitched me up inside and outside my lip and on my nose.'

No wonder Henderson joked: 'I told
Jonjo I wanted a jockey, not the Phantom of the Opera. On Friday night
AP's agent Dave Roberts assured me he would not be riding here. But with
him you never say never.

'We all love our horses, but they
are accidents waiting to happen. I gather that if AP had been standing
any closer to the horse he would not be here now.'

On Sunday, McCoy is down for one ride at Carlisle, a round journey from his home of eight hours.

On Saturday, he confirmed that he
intended to fulfil his booking on a horse called Valley View as he
closes in on his next target of 4,000 winners.

My Tent Or Yours gave Henderson a quick double following the victory of Hadrian's Approach in the Ascot Underwriting Beginners' Chase.

Favourite backers were delighted with
the result when the 7-4 market leader was announced the winner after
snatching the spoils from The Druids Nephew on the line.

The runner-up had looked assured of
the spoils but Barry Geraghty got an excellent response from the
Henderson-trained winner to get up by a nose in the shadow of the post.

Rolling Aces finished third, three and a quarter lengths adrift.

Henderson said: 'Ascot takes a bit of jumping and he was learning all of the way around.

'I'm delighted to be here talking to you as I didn't think that he had won anyway.'

Roberto Goldback made it a hat-trick for Henderson as he ran out an impressive winner of the United House Gold Cup Handicap Chase.

Previously trained by Dessie Hughes and Jessica Harrington in Ireland, Roberto Goldback was making his debut for the Seven Barrows team in this Grade Three event.

It proved a dramatic renewal of the three-mile contest with a heavy fall for Charlie Poste from Le Beau Bai early on, while Sam Waley-Cohen also took a nasty-looking tumble from Frisco Depot as the race really started to hot up.

Geraghty looked to be in the driving seat from some way out aboard 9-1 shot Roberto Goldback though, and a sound leap at the last sealed a nine-length victory.

Duke Of Lucca kept on for second with Alfie Spinner a further four and a half lengths back in fourth.

Henderson said: 'We thought that he would run well but it was his first start for me and I didn't know enough about him.

'Ascot (for this race) was the reason we brought him over.

'We only started the horses really in the last couple of weeks and a day like this makes us feel a lot better.”

Raya Star and It's A Gimme could be
set for a rematch at Cheltenham in two weeks' time after fighting out a
thrilling finish in the William Hill Priority Prices Handicap Hurdle.

Raya Star
(8-1) just mastered It's A Gimme by half a length and the Racing Post
Hurdle at Prestbury Park on November 18 definitely beckons for the Alan
King-trained winner.

King said: 'He was carrying a lot of weight but I'm thrilled and I hope that I left a little to work on.

'He'll go to Cheltenham now, even
though he'll be reassessed, and is settling better. I don't mind going
up 5lb for winning a race like this.

'We'll then decide whether to jump a fence or not.'

The winner is a best priced 10-1 with
Paddy Power and Stan James for his Cheltenham assignment, while It's A
Gimme is generally available at 8-1.

A 9lb rise in the weights was not enough to stop Ivor's King completing a hat-trick in the Gardiner & Theobald Novices' Handicap Hurdle.

Previously a winner at Exeter and
Wincanton, Colin Tizzard's charge turned the two-mile-three-furlong heat
into a procession in the hands of the trainer's son, Joe.

Turning for home, Otto The Great was
the only danger to the front-running Ivor's King, but he proved no match
as the 7-2 favourite pulled nine lengths clear with a further two and a
quarter lengths back to Thoresby in third.

Tizzard snr said: 'You can't hold this horse and he's ridden on his own at home as all he wants to do is gallop.'

The winning rider, who was claiming
his first win here for over a decade, added: 'He is improving and gave
me a better feel than at Wincanton last time.'

The ultimate love story Frankel's first date could be with unbeaten Australian mare Black Caviar

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UPDATED:

17:00 GMT, 23 October 2012

It would be a match made in heaven. Two of the greatest race horses in the sport could be put together in an effort to produce future generations of history-making stallions and mares.

Frankel has been shortlisted as a possible first date for Australia's unbeaten mare Black Caviar.

The two highest-rated horses in the
world last season could meet in the breeding sheds once time is called
on the racing career of the Peter Moody-trained six-year-old.

Wonder horse: Frankel signed off with an unblemished 14-win record

Frankel signed off at Ascot on Saturday with an unblemished 14-win record, whereas Black Caviar is unbeaten in 22 starts.

Frankel will now be retired to stud at Newmarket for a second career as a stallion during which he is expected to earn more than 100 million for his owner Prince Khalid Abdullah, a member of the Saudi Arabian ruling family.

'We would consider going to Frankel because he is clearly the best distance horse in the world,' Black Caviar's co-owner, Neil Werrett.

'There would have to be a few conditions that would have to be worked out to make it happen, but the two best horses in the world together – that would be something.

'I might be a little biased, but I would say he is the second best horse I have ever seen.'

Happy ending Black Caviar is an unbeaten mare, and could be paired with superhorse Frankel

Frankel has been shortlisted as a possible first date for Australia's unbeaten mare Black Caviar.

The two highest-rated horses in the
world last season could meet in the breeding sheds once time is called
on the racing career of the Peter Moody-trained six-year-old.

Wonder horse: Frankel signed off with an unblemished 14-win record

Frankel signed off at Ascot on Saturday with an unblemished 14-win record, whereas Black Caviar is unbeaten in 22 starts.

Frankel will now be retired to stud at Newmarket for a second career as a stallion during which he is expected to earn more than 100 million for his owner Prince Khalid Abdullah, a member of the Saudi Arabian ruling family.

'We would consider going to Frankel because he is clearly the best distance horse in the world,' Black Caviar's co-owner, Neil Werrett.

'There would have to be a few conditions that would have to be worked out to make it happen, but the two best horses in the world together – that would be something.

'I might be a little biased, but I would say he is the second best horse I have ever seen.'

Frankel deserved every accolade
Roget's Thesaurus could bestow, and he was lavished with every one of
them in the accompanying media love-in.

His 14th and farewell victory in the
mile-and-a-quarter Qipco Champion Stakes on alien, rain-softened
terrain, against classy rivals, confirmed his status as arguably the
greatest equine specimen in 300 years of breeding.

As for Sir Henry Richard Amherst
Cecil, nephew of the third Lord Amherst of Hackney, he is left with a
hoarse whisper after a six-year fight against cancer waged as defiantly
and jauntily as the angle at which he wore his brown trilby.

His record since beginning his career
in 1969 – 10-time champion trainer, 37 Classic winners, four Derby
winners and more than 70 Royal Ascot winners – is a mark of the man.

But figures do not reveal enough
about his special touch with horses and humans. He trains by instinct
and sagacity rather than any manual. With regard to his common touch
with us two-legged creatures, he is in danger of giving toffs a good
name.

Downing Street take note. Always as
ready to talk to a scruff as a prince, he doffed his hat to ladies as
they greeted him. He signed autographs, left-handed with a big downward
stroke for the first line of the H and a quick scrawl thereafter.

One woman asked him a question and he pointed to his mouth, leaving her to lipread that he could barely talk.

He thought better of it and returned.
Pointing to the grass with those big expressive hands of his, he half
mimed, half whispered by way of explaining that the going was not
ideally to Frankel's liking.

Cecil craned his neck to tell me: 'I probably got him too relaxed.'

Frankel was dawdling in the stalls as the rest of the field left. It made a race of it.

But Cecil added: 'He's a magnificent horse. He is the best I've had and the best I've seen.

'I'd be amazed if there has ever been a better one. This has been the perfect day.'

Cecil took off his hat for the
presentation. In fact, the millinery is a recent addition to his
wardrobe as chemotherapy has left his hair wispy.

The ovation he received was the biggest of the day. Three cheers were proposed.

We are not acclaiming a saint. He is a
69-year-old who laughs at the notion he might be the only boy from his
prep school, Sunningdale, to fail the exam to Eton.

He went instead to Canford and then,
with his twin brother David, to the Royal Agricultural College,
Cirencester, where by his own admission he studied 'drinking and
gambling'.

He left without sitting an exam. His
life was occasionally paraded in the gossip columns, proving that
stables life and carnal lusts are not just Jilly Cooper fantasies.

He spiralled into decline when his twin died of cancer in 2000 and hit the bottle hard.

His career was ebbing away at the same time, a falling out with the significant owner, Sheik Mohammed, central to the malaise.

The 2005 season is what the Queen,
who was in attendance among Saturday's 32,000 sell-out crowd, might call
his annus horribilis. He had just 12 winners, 101 fewer than nine years
before.

His prize money amounted to a meagre 145,000.

Royal approval: The Queen watched Frankel win the Champion Stakes at Ascot

While on Newmarket Heath he overheard someone say: 'That's Henry Cecil. He should have retired a long time ago.'

It fired him up. This year he won
2.65million. The dandyish Cecil , whose catholic tastes are hinted at
by the tin soldiers and fossils on display in his study, admits that
Frankel, along with his third wife Jane, has sustained him through the
illness.

How will he fare now that the
four-year-old colt, his all-consuming professional passion, is going to
Banstead Manor Stud to begin his life as a playboy bachelor

Around 120 trysts with the world's most alluring mares are planned next year at 100,000 a go.

Frankel deserves it. He is the
outstanding horse of our generation. Prior to Saturday, he had won his
previous 13 races by a total of 74 and a half lengths.

And if arguments could be put forward
for the likes of Sea Bird, Mill Reef, Brigadier Gerard, Sea The Stars
and Dancing Brave as being rivals for the title of greatest ever, no
horse ever did more to send the spirits soaring than Frankel.

Twice in his iridescent career he won
by 10 lengths or more, including unforgettably at Royal Ascot this
year.W e can laud him to the heavens now, but you sensed the crowd were
nervous before the race.

Eyes down: Willie Carson and Claire Balding take in the action

Going gets tough: there had been worries about the state of the track ahead of the big race

Yes, Frankel was 2-11 but there was
so much legendary status at stake in these sodden conditions that it was
a roar of relief as much as joy that broke out as he first drew level
with the French gelding Cirrus Des Aigles at the crest of the bend and
then quickened away to triumph by a length and three quarters.

Jockey Tom Queally said: 'He didn't
bounce along the ground like he can. I gave him a crack (of the whip),
which isn't common, and he powered off. He's done so much for so many
people.

'For me to get this chance is a million-to-one shot.'

Yes, Frankel has added lustre to Flat racing to rival that contemporary legend of National Hunt, Kauto Star.

No, Frankel never raced over a
mile-and-a-half, an omission some believe means that he cannot be hailed
as first among equals. I leave that to the equine historians. I merely
celebrate a free-flowing, big-lunged, long-striding phenomenon and his
stylish trainer for their own unique splendour.

Full house: It was no surprise to see the course packed to the rafters